Pneumonia

Pneumonia. Just a touch of it. She doesn't act like she has pneumonia, but she does. In fact, I had to take her to the ER last night because she was coughing non-stop. I mean like almost throw-up non-stop coughing. She made some fast friends there like the admitting nurse who was amazed when Shelby just about coughed up a lung then continued her conversation like nothing happened. She took her for a wheelchair ride to get some ice chips and took her to raid the ER's sticker collection. Then there were the x-ray technicians who cracked up while Shelby "posed" for each of her chest x-rays. As soon as they were done, she looked at them and said, very seriously, "Now how about that sucker?" Yes, we do end up bribing her alot to get through these procedures that she knows all too well for her young 3 1/2 years. She came home with ink drawings all over her legs because I let her have my pen to bribe her to let the doctor look in her ears and mouth. So she has pneumonia for the first time in her life. She is on antibiotics for 10 days because they're not certain if its viral or bacterial, but its best to play it safe with Shelby - so, antiobiotics it is. She started out with a cough mid-week that wasn't horrible, but annoying enough to wake her a bit at night. Then Saturday afternoon she developed a fever. Early evening when the cough wouldn't quit we decided to have her checked out. When the ER doctor (who, by the way, said "I've seen Shelby before." Yea, no duh. We've only been to the ER about a million times since she was born.) peeked his head inside the curtain to give me the chest x-ray results he kind-of shook his head in disbelief. Here is a kid who is talking up a storm in-between gut-wrenching coughs, acting like she doesn't have a care in the world or who is feeling too good to be brought to the ER, but does has pneumonia. I told him it takes alot to knock her down. I didn't doubt that she didn't feel good, I just don't think she gives into those feelings. So when he said to watch for lethargy in her I said "Yea, o.k." Really I was saying "whatever." I mean, come on, through 7 broken bones and several medical procedures only twice have I seen her act lethargic. First when she was a newborn who was so jaundiced she was orange and second when she had a temp of 104.9 in November of 2004. Otherwise, she's cruised through everything else. Thank you God for her fighter spirit!!!

So we'll be laying low with her for a few days. Translation = we're not letting her leave the house. You know she will be running around, though, acting like her usual madwomen-self and I'll be thinking "you go girl, you kick that pneumonia's butt!"

Oh, and by the way, she was pretty pissed when we left the ER and she declared, "But I still have my cough!" I like a girl who expects nothing but the best. She went willing with me there, putting up no fight at all, to have her cough taken care of, only to still leave with it. I'm sure she's thinking those ER docs are some kind-of duds. That's my Shelby.

(P.S. I am supposed to call her Pediatrician tomorrow morning to update him on all this. She also had some blood in her stools Saturday morning that gave us a bit of a jolt, but we've just been keeping our eyes on it. Let's hope it doesn't turn into anything.)